Bill can’t handle the truth: De Blasio's continued dismissal of charter school achievement

Someone smart in City Hall (no joking, now) would do Mayor de Blasio a favor with a frank talk about embarrassing himself.

For two days running, Wednesday and Thursday, the mayor looked downright foolish in trying to belittle the gains achieved by charter school students on the latest English and math standardized tests.

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Charter kids, who make up one-tenth of the city's public school enrollment, markedly outpaced children enrolled in traditional district schools.

The proportion of district kids who passed the English test jumped from 30% to 38% (an eight-point rise), while the charter passing rate climbed from 29% to 43% (a 14-point rise).

On the math test, district proficiency rose from 35% to 36% (a one-point rise), while charters moved from 44% to 49% (a five-point gain).

Although de Blasio and Chancellor Carmen Fariña proudly cheered the sizable gains racked up by district schools, the mayor couldn't muster even the sound of one hand clapping for the larger gains and higher passing rates of charter schools.

"It's not a state secret that some substantial piece of that is based on charters that focus on test prep. And if that's where they put a lot of their time and energy, of course it could yield better test scores. But we don't think that's good educational policy. So we're going to do it the way that we believe is right for our children."

De Blasio added: "That's because of a heavy focus on test prep, which is just not the philosophy of this administration and of (the Department of Education), nor do I think it's what the vast majority of parents want to see for their kids."

Follow the mayor's loony logic: The district school students for whom he and Fariña are responsible have received better educations than charter students, enabling the district kids to score lower on standardized tests but still learn more.

At the same time, charter students have been ill-served because they have done better on the very tests whose results he cites as evidence of the success of his school policies.

In attributing a "substantial piece" of charter gains to schools that, he says, teach to the test, the mayor is no doubt referring to Success Academy schools, which enjoy astronomically high pass rates and are run by his nemesis Eva Moskowitz.

He's wrong about that "substantial piece." If you exclude Success schools, the charter pass rate still rose 13 points on the English test and four on the math test.

Not satisfied with trashing charters' superior test results, the mayor insinuated that they have an unfair edge in admitting their student bodies — "I have real issues and concerns with the lottery process," he said — and trotted out the chestnut that "some charters sadly have a long history of exclusion," meaning that, although they admit students by lottery, they cream the best kids.

First, that's false. In roughly a quarter of charter schools, only 30% or less of kids made the grade in English. Second, the collective scores of charter schools outpaced the collective scores of district schools, which included the scores of top-performing schools in more affluent neighborhoods.

De Blasio entered City Hall hoping to squelch charter school growth, at least in part because, with largely nonunionized staffs, they are anathema to the teachers union. Gov. Cuomo blocked the mayor's efforts.

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Now, while touting a sudden leap in district scores as sign of mayoral success, de Blasio is struggling — and failing — to explain why charter schools did much better. None are so blind.